James Cameron has committed to making two sequels to his record-breaking 3D epic "Avatar" for Fox. The movies are scheduled for release in late 2014 and 2015, which means he won't direct other features for the next three or four years.

The writer-director had conversations with Columbia about directing "Cleopatra," starring Angelina Jolie, but that possibility is off the table, meaning the studio will have to look for another director.

But Cameron has two major projects he is producing during the next few years: Guillermo del Toro's "At the Mountains of Madness" for Universal and a remake of "Fantastic Voyage" that Laeta Kalogridis is rewriting for Fox and Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment.

For the time being, however, he will dive back into writing screenplays for more stories that take place on Pandora. His first film about that invented world and its natives' struggles for survival in the face of greedy Earth capitalists grossed $2.8 billion worldwide after it was released in December.

"We'll continue to follow the same people on the same planet," producer Jon Landau said Wednesday during Paul Kagan's 3D Media Markets conference in New York. But, he allowed, "We might go underwater."

The filmmakers plan to shoot the movies back to back with much of the same cast. Asked whether stars Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana had signed for the sequels, Landau said, "We won't have a problem."

The ongoing "Avatar" chapters will be the CAA-repped Cameron's ninth and 10th features as a writer-director; he also made "True Lies," "The Terminator," "Aliens" and "The Abyss."

Fox also is moving forward with converted 3D rereleases of Cameron's "Titanic" and George Lucas' "Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace." Both are tentatively set for spring 2012 openings.

“Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” - Andy Warhol

The filmmakers plan to shoot the movies back to back with much of the same cast. Asked whether stars Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana had signed for the sequels, Landau said, "We won't have a problem. (He made Clash of the Titans and she made a film with Paul Walker. We got them by the balls."

i don't know about the paul walker film but Clash of the Titans was a huge box office smash.

Sam Worthington is going to be (already is) another Ewan McGregor who gets credit for doing absolutely nothing to contribute to a film's success. he just shows up. that's what he does best, so it's obvious he'd want to take every possible opportunity to tag along to a guarranteed juggernaut.

yes, but Clash is crap and everyone knows it. People went to see it and said: "well, it was crap, ok, let's move on". People went to see Avatar and came out wanting to reforest their garden. And then it became the biggest box office hit of all time, and then it won a bunch of oscars. So the pedigree level could only be maintained by these actors by doing quality stuff, awards friendly, indie whatever films. Saldańa is trying but it's hard. Worthington is another McGregor in my opinion.

James Cameron Eyeing 60 Frames Per Second for 'Avatar' Sequels (Exclusive)The director tells THR that he would "personally favor" 60 fps as he urges the production and exhibition industries to adopt higher frame rates.Source: THR

Jean-Luc Godard may have famously said that “cinema is truth 24 frames per second," but James Cameron is currently convinced that shooting at a rate of 60 frames per second offers a more truthful image.

As he readies to shoot Avatar 2 and 3, the technologically-savvy director has been looking at higher frame rates of 48 and 60 frames per second. And, he tells The Hollywood Reporter, at the moment he would “personally favor” 60 fps. “I think it is such an affinitive answer,” he said. “But other people may choose 48 for other reasons.”

Last March at CinemaCon, Cameron said he “fully intends” to film the Avatar sequels at a higher frame rate and he presented an extensive test showing the differences between images shot at 24, 48 and 60 fps. At that time, he said, "The 3D shows you a window into reality; the higher frame rate takes the glass out of the window.”

But as for choosing between 48—which Peter Jackson has selected for production of The Hobbit—and 60, Cameron left that for the industry to discuss.

“The reason I went down that path is because I believe it makes for better 3D,” Cameron said of his advocacy of higher frame rates in a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “There were lots of arguments for why 48 and why 60. My feeling is if it is a software upgrade (for digital cinema projectors), do both. It doesn’t change anything at the projector; you don’t have to change the lamp house or the lenses. If you are uploading software you can upload it for 48 and 60 and let the filmmakers decide.”

In terms of how he will decide at what rate to shoot the Avatar sequels, Cameron said, “If the exhibitors will adopt the idea of a dual standard, than I’ll probably want to shoot 60. If they don’t, then I will have to look very carefully at the pros and cons of 60 and 48.”

Frame rates are the number of images displayed by a projector within one second. 24 frames per second (fps) has long been the standard in cinema; television uses higher rates including 50 fps and 60 fps, which can mean less motion blur and judder in the images.

In related news, Lightstorm Entertainment and digital cinema projector maker Christie recently inked a five-year agreement aimed at furthering 3D digital cinema and the use of higher frame rates. Additionally, Christie has started to demonstrate the use of higher frames rates within a single projector setup.

As part of the agreement with Lightstorm, Christie will assist in outfitting Cameron’s new production facilities, including two screening rooms that will serve as virtual production sites for the next two Avatar movies.

Projectors are just one part of the equation. Cameron said, “The cost (to go to higher frame rates) is not at the camera, which is very straightforward; the cost is not at the projectors, because it is a software upgrade. I could go out right now, shoot a movie at 60 fps if it was all live action and project it, and have a stunning effect. It has value immediately. What we have to work on is the FX workflow—primarily the render pipeline.”

“The trick in the near term is going to be to not have a big upward inflection in the cost of visual effects,” he explained. “I believe there are ways to do it, but there is some code that needs to be written to do it, and I’m working with some of the big FX providers on that now. You can’t expect people to run off adopting a higher frame rate if it is going to cost an addition 10 percent of their FX costs, which are already pretty high. We have to get it down to 1 percent or so, which I think is achievable.

“Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” - Andy Warhol

James Cameron Talks about Building Momentum on Writing AVATAR 2 and AVATAR 3Source: Collider

Last November, James Cameron said he hoped to have the scripts for Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 finished by February, and planned to shoot later this year. February has now come and gone, and Cameron is still at work on getting back into the world of Pandora. But not to worry, Avatar fans. Cameron is still plugging away at the sequels, and he’s close to reaching the point where the story begins to write itself.

“I’m working on ‘Avatar 2′ and ‘Avatar 3.’ I was talking the other day with Peter Jackson and said, ‘You had it easy dude. You had the books when you did the second and third ‘Lord of the Rings.’ I have to create my own books in my head and extract a script from it. I’m deep into it and I’m living in Pandora right now. There is that start up torque where you feel it’s coming to you. Then you build up momentum. That’s when it gets fun. The characters talk and it’s writing itself. I’m almost there right now. It’s building fast.”

I suppose for Cameron, “book in my head” equals “FernGully: The Last Rainforest“. The good news is that there was a direct-to-video sequel, FernGully 2: The Magical Rescue.

Cameron says that for him to get into the headspace to write the sequels, he needs isolation. “I’m calling you from New Zealand right now where I’m writing on a little farm,” Cameron told PGS. “When you live in a special world like Pandora, you have to live in that world.”

Finally, when asked about the pressure of topping his record-breaking and influential film, and when we might see the sequels, Cameron responded:

“Pressure, no. It’s a little daunting because sequels are always tricky. You have to be surprising and stay ahead of audience anticipation. At the same time, you have to massage their feet with things that they know and love about the first film. I’ve walked that line in the past, so I’m not too worried about it. At the same time, I definitely have to deliver the goods…As for a release date that will be determined by when I get the script out. No pressure!”

“Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” - Andy Warhol

James Cameron Talks about Building Momentum on Writing AVATAR 2 and AVATAR 3Source: Collider

Cameron says that for him to get into the headspace to write the sequels, he needs isolation. “I’m calling you from New Zealand right now where I’m writing on a little farm,” Cameron told PGS. “When you live in a special world like Pandora, you have to live in that world.”

No wonder everything that I've written lately ends up being about living in a house where the people who enter ask, "is there a gas leak in here?" With 3 grown adults who can't clean up after themselves.

I was talking the other day with Peter Jackson and said, ‘You had it easy dude. You had the books when you did the second and third ‘Lord of the Rings.’ I have to create my own books in my head and extract a script from it. I’m deep into it and I’m living in Pandora right now.”

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — James Cameron says his vision for his three "Avatar" sequels is to create a family epic in the mold of "The Godfather" that will introduce viewers to new cultures and go underwater on his fictional moon Pandora.

The director announced Monday he will be filming the sequels in New Zealand, where he shot the triple Academy Award-winning original. In an interview with The Associated Press, Cameron also talked about life on a New Zealand farm, where he's growing walnuts and allowing his children to roam.

Cameron, 59, said he plans to release the first sequel in 2016, seven years after the release of "Avatar," which has become the highest-grossing film in history with a box office take of nearly $2.8 billion.

He said a core team has been developing new software for the sequels even while he's been gone on other projects, including 18 months planning a 7-mile descent to the deepest part of the ocean, which he successfully completed last year.

"It's going to be a lot of new imagery and a lot of new environments and creatures across Pandora," he said. "We're blowing it out all over the place. At first I thought I was going to take it onto other worlds as well, in the same solar system, but it turned out not to be necessary. I mean the Pandora that we have imagined will be a fantasy land that is going to occupy people for decades to come, the way I see it."

Cameron said the films will explore different Na'vi cultures as well the cultures of other Pandora creatures.

"There's a fair bit of underwater stuff. It's been inaccurately said that the second film takes place underwater. That's not true," he said. "There are underwater scenes and surface-water scenes having to do with indigenous ocean cultures that are distributed across the three films."

He said water is enormously difficult to recreate on a computer, something he's been talking about with Joe Letteri, the visual effects supervisor at Weta Digital.

"I said Joe, you know, there's a lot of water," Cameron said. "And he basically said 'Bring it on. We're ready.'"

He said the first movie focused on the main character, Jake Sully.

"It was very Jake-centric. His story seen through his eyes," Cameron said. "We spread it around quite a bit more as we go forward. It's really the story of his family, the family that he creates on Pandora. His extended family. So think of it as a family saga like 'The Godfather.'"

Cameron said the theme of sustainability that runs through the "Avatar" series also extends to his personal life. He and fifth wife Suzy Amis bought a farm about 90 minutes' drive from Wellington where they spend some of the year with their three children. Cameron said he's putting in 650 walnut trees.

"There'll also be tree crops, grains, produce, it will be quite a mixed bag," he said. "But really, I think of it as an experimental station to look at various sustainable agriculture approaches."

A native of Canada, Cameron said the New Zealand farm feels like "closing a loop" after he spent summers on his grandfather's farm in southern Ontario.

"The kids love it here. They love that combination of freedom and responsibility that you get here because you can run freely," he said. "There are no predators and snakes and that sort of thing. We just let them go out with a walkie-talkie, and as long as they are back by dinner, we don't care where they are."

He said he plans to bring his own helicopter from California to help make the commute from the farm to Wellington when he's working on the movies.

Before then, he said, he'll be throwing a Christmas party for the community around his farm. He said about 95 people turned up last year but he worries that numbers could be down this year because it's going to be an all-vegan menu, a lifestyle his family recently adopted.

“Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” - Andy Warhol